A New York Minute
by celeria
Summary: Set during book #18, Stacey's Mistake. What Dawn and Kristy talk about that night while sharing the sofa bed. Light Dawn/Kristy femslash.


Light Dawn/Kristy femslash, rated PG-13.  Kristy's POV, first-person narration.  Set during #18, _Stacey's Mistake_, specifically the scene when they're fighting and Stacey divides them up into separate beds for their first night in New York.

* * *

Afterward, I felt kind of bad because Dawn was lying as far away from me on the sofa bed as possible and alternately crying and cursing. At least it sounded like cursing. I threw my turtleneck and jeans off the bed, finished pulling my t-shirt over my head, yanked my hair out of its ponytail, threw the elastic on the floor too, and lay down next to her. "Dawn?"

No answer.

"Look, I'm sorry about – uh. You know." I have a hard time apologizing to people. I know you're supposed to, I know why, and I always make the kids I babysit for – particularly David Michael and Andrew and Karen – apologize to people. But I'm still not good at it. "I didn't mean to make fun of you earlier."

Still no answer.

I sighed. "Are you mad because I made fun of you earlier?"

I heard a little sniffle.

I reached over and tugged at her shoulder. She was wearing a big green nightshirt that made her hair look pale and soft sandwiched between her shirt and the sheets, and I winced, wondering when I, Kristy Thomas, starting describing people's hair with adjectives like _soft_. "Are you mad because _Mary Anne_ made fun of you?"

A louder sniffle this time.

I tried patting her shoulder. That felt good. It felt like the way I'd pat Karen or Andrew's back when they were upset, or even scratch Shannon's ears. I said as much to Dawn and heard the faintest little hiccup of laughter. "You know that all that stuff I said about alligators in the sewers was just a joke. I got the idea when I read that article in the paper about how all the power in New York went off last night and no one had any running water or lights for 36 hours."

Dawn finally rolled over, and her eyes were wide and her face was already as pale as her hair. "All the _power_ went off?" she squeaked. "For 36 whole _hours_?"

I punched her shoulder and grinned. "Got you again."

She managed a smile, finally, and scrubbed at her eyes with the back of her hand. It was something that Sam or Charlie would do and I told her that too and she tried another little laugh. I couldn't find any tissues, but there was a big handkerchief in the back pocket of the jeans I'd worn today, and I passed it over to her. "Sorry about Mary Anne." That was easier to say because it wasn't something _I_ was apologizing for.

Dawn shrugged, making her long blonde hair, which was spilling over her back like a wide waterfall (oh, no. Did I just use a waterfall metaphor?), move against the pillow. "She must be spending too much time with you."

My jaw dropped and I glared, wondering if that was what Dawn really thought of me – granted, I know I have a big mouth, but Dawn isn't usually the type to point it out to me. I closed my mouth and then opened it again, ready to launch into a lengthy dispute about how at least _I_ wasn't mean when I opened my big mouth, when I saw that she was smiling. Just a little, but it was enough to make me punch her shoulder again, lightly.

Dawn cleared her throat and propped herself up on her elbow. Her long hair streamed down the bed and across my neck, tickling my ear. I shoved it away, wondering why _anyone_ would want hair that long, but it did look kind of pretty, on her. "I guess it wasn't just that she was making fun of me. It was – well, it's _Mary Anne_, you know? She's usually so …"

"Full of tears?" I suggested, remembering the time the entire BSC had a fight and she cried. And the time she burst into tears in front of our entire seventh-grade homeroom. And the time she sobbed all through a sleepover at my house when we were ten because she'd left her stuffed cat at home – even though my mother offered to walk her home to get it. And the time in second grade she – 

Dawn laughed. "I was going to say sensitive," she admitted, "but that works too."

"You could tease her about being a walking guidebook," I said knowingly. One of the things about having a best friend is knowing just what will make her cry. Mostly I've found that everything from cute grasshoppers to undernourished butterflies will make Mary Anne cry, but she'd been Tourist Central on this trip, not the Underfed Butterfly Advocate.

"She already cried tonight," Dawn said with a touch of impatience, cupping her chin in her palm. I grinned again, because that was certainly true. "I don't need to make her cry _more_. I'm just _mad_ at her."

"Yeah, that's okay. I get mad at her too."

"Yeah." Dawn stared at her fingers for a while, and I wondered if she wanted to say something. "Sorry you had a bad night. With Claudia."

It took me a second to realize what she was talking about. "Oh, yeah. Well, you know, the thing was, it wasn't because she cut in on me. Me and Coby. You know? We were just talking baseball and stuff. It was just, she thinks because she's all sophisticated and stuff, she's the only one who can – do stuff with boys. You know?"

"No, I don't know." Dawn's voice was flat.

My mind raced, wondering what I'd said wrong. That sounded like the way people sound when I've said something wrong. "I mean because she thought we were being – um – _romantic_." The word sounded absolutely disgusting in my mouth. "And she's the grown-up one. So she's the only one who can have a romantic, um, thing. Even though it wasn't."

"So you didn't like him?"

"He was cool. I wish there was a guy to talk about sports and stuff like that in Stoneybrook. Besides my brothers," I added quickly, not wanting Dawn to think that I didn't appreciate Sam and Charlie. She's still upset about Jeff having moved back to California, so brother-bashing isn't a bonding activity for Dawn right now.

"No, I mean, _like_ him."

"No, but he was great, I – Dawn?" I frowned at her, wondering why she'd asked the same question twice in a row. That's not Dawn. She usually knows what she wants to say and then stops when she gets her answer. "Is something the matter?"

"No." She was blushing furiously in the dim light from one of the streetlights outside Stacey's apartment, despite the fact that the shades were drawn. Blushing is also an un-Dawn thing. "I mean, I'm glad you didn't – um – you didn't, you know, _like_ him. Like, _like_ him. Like a, um, romantic, you know." She sounds like the word is as gross to her as it is for me. "I guess I was, um, jealous of him."

"_Jealous_?" I repeated incredulously. I can't imagine anyone being jealous _over_ me. I've had plenty of people, mostly boys, who have been jealous of how well I bat, how fast I run, or even that I have two big brothers. But no one's ever been jealous of, like, Alan Gray for asking me to the Halloween Hop in seventh grade. It was a completely weird feeling. But maybe a nice one, if I took a few years to get used to it.

She looked embarrassed. It was also completely weird to see our normally calm, California-casual treasurer turning very, very red like Mallory's hair and nibbling away on her lip like Jessi does when she gets nervous.

I grinned again, then leaned over and kissed her. She tasted like that weird tap water that Stacey insists _everyone_ drinks in New York, and the tangy acid of tomatoes from the heroes. I couldn't help grinning while she nibbled on my bottom lip, and I suddenly thought it might be funny to point out that she had _nothing_ to worry about when it came to Coby.

She pulled away, and her long hair curled around my wrist where I'd been touching her face. "What's so funny?"

I managed to twist my lips into a properly somber expression. "I was just remembering that they said on the news mutant tomatoes are on the rise in New York City. Did you ask the deli where they got those tomatoes before you ate that sandwich, Dawn?"

Dawn threw her pillow in my face. "Goodnight, Kristy."

_finis___


End file.
